{"id":17284,"date":"2024-08-12T01:14:01","date_gmt":"2024-08-11T19:44:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=17284"},"modified":"2025-04-05T03:19:19","modified_gmt":"2025-04-04T21:49:19","slug":"tantalum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/tantalum\/","title":{"rendered":"What is Tantalum?"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><strong>About Tantalum:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>It is a <strong>rare metal<\/strong> with symbol Ta and atomic number 73.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Occurrence<\/strong>: <strong>Raw tantalum rarely occurs in nature<\/strong>. Instead, it is <strong>typically foundin<\/strong> the <strong>ore columbite-tantalite<\/strong> (usually referred to as <strong>coltan<\/strong>).<\/li>\n<li><strong>Major Producers<\/strong>: <strong>Democratic Republic of the Congo<\/strong>, Rwanda, Brazil, and Nigeria.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Properties<\/strong>:\n<ul>\n<li>Classified as a <strong>transition metal<\/strong>, Tantalum is a <strong>solid at room temperature<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>It is a <strong>shiny, silvery metal<\/strong> which is <strong>soft when it is pure<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>It is almost <strong>immune to chemical attack<\/strong> at temperatures <strong>below 150-degree celsius.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Tantalum is <strong>virtually resistant to corrosion<\/strong> due to an oxide film on its surface.<\/li>\n<li><strong>When pure<\/strong>, tantalum is <strong>ductile<\/strong>, meaning it can be stretched, pulled, or drawn into a thin wire or thread without breaking.<\/li>\n<li>It <strong>belongs to<\/strong> a class of metals known as <strong>refractory metals<\/strong>, which are defined by their <strong>strong resistance to heat and wear.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>It has an <strong>extremely high melting point<\/strong>, exceeded only by tungsten and rhenium.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Applications:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>It is most prominently used in the <strong>electronic sector.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>The <strong>capacitors made from tantalum<\/strong> are capable of <strong>storing more electricityinsmaller sizes<\/strong> without much leakage than any other type of capacitor.<\/li>\n<li>This makes them <strong>ideal for use in portable electronic devices<\/strong> such as smartphones, laptops, and digital cameras.<\/li>\n<li>As tantalum has a <strong>high melting point<\/strong>, it is frequently <strong>used as a substitute forplatinum<\/strong>, which is more expensive.<\/li>\n<li>It is also used to <strong>make components for chemical plants<\/strong>, <strong>nuclear power plants,<\/strong> aeroplanes, and missiles.<\/li>\n<li>It does <strong>not react with bodily fluids<\/strong> and is <strong>used to make surgical equipment<\/strong> and <strong>implants<\/strong>, like <strong>artificial joints.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>A <strong>composite consisting of tantalum carbide (TaC) and graphite<\/strong> is <strong>one of the hardest materials known<\/strong> and is <strong>used on<\/strong> the cutting <strong>edges of high-speed machine tools.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<h3><strong>Q1<\/strong>: What is ductility?<\/h3>\n<p>It is the ability of a material to have its shape changed (as by being drawn out into wire or thread) without losing strength or breaking.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/pib.gov.in\/PressReleaseIframePage.aspx?PRID=2042603#:~:text=In%20order%20to%20strengthen%20the,Coal%20and%20Mines%20Shri%20G.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><strong>Tantalum Deposits<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tantalum is a rare metal with symbol Ta and atomic number 73.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":17285,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-17284","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17284\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}